Non-Coding RNA's and Disease

Question 2

What are miRNA’s?

Answer 2

• MicroRNAs (miRNA) are small, highly conserved non-coding RNA molecules involved in the regulation of gene expression
• MicroRNAs are transcribed by RNA polymerases II and III
• They are approximately 22 nucleotides in length and regulate the expression of as much as 30% of all mammalian protein-encoding genes.

Question 3

What is the clinical utility of analysing miRNAs?

Answer 3

• miRNA expression is dysregulated in human disease;
  
  • including amplification or deletion
  • abnormal transcription
  • dysregulated epigenetic changes
  • defects in the miRNA biogenesis machinery
• MiRNAs may function as either oncogenes or tumour suppressors under certain conditions.
• Thus miRNAs are being pursued as potential biomarkers in a broad spectrum of diseases

Question 4

What technologies are available to assess miRNAs?

Answer 4

• Individual miRNA can be quantified using molecular methods such as rq-PCR
• Panels of miRNAs can be assessed using arrays and/or NGS technology
• e.g. A microarray-based miRNA test is currently available for use in characterizing cancer origin
• RNA sequencing is rapidly replacing gene expression microarrays in many labs enabels genome-wide quantify, discover and profile RNAs.

Question 5

What are the challenges faced by implementing miRNA and RNA-seq assays into routine clinical service?

Answer 5

• Establishment of benchmark standards
• Assay optimization for clinical conditions
• Assay standardisation
• Demonstration of assay reproducibility
• miRNA sequence database errors
• suboptimal RNA extraction methods
• detection assay variability
• a vast array of online resources for bioinformatic analyses
• non-standardized statistical analyses for miRNA clinical testing.

Question 6

What diseases are miRNA analysis making the biggest impact to date?

Answer 6

Cancer

Cardiovascular disease

Question 7

What paper reviews the current challenges for translating miRNA analysis into clinical practice?

Answer 7

http: //ac.els-cdn.com/S1521690X16300409/1-s2.0-S1521690X16300409-main.pdf?_tid=30e95686-7aa5-11e7-b842-00000aab0f01&acdnat=1502023736_85efb4c4cf104bb835dca4013e7b7cbe
https: //www.nature.com/bjc/journal/v113/n4/pdf/bjc2015253a.pdf